Category Archives: Movie Reviews

Horror Movies Can Suck and That is More Than a Play on Words

I don’t want this website to become all about Jeremy Sisto, but I accidentally bought a movie with him in it yesterday (ignoring the questions about why, if I’m broke – and I am – I’m still so totally seduced by the 4 for $20 Previously Viewed section at Blockbuster) called The Thirst. It had lots of people in it, but I mainly bought it because it had Clare Kramer in it, and I loved her on Buffy.  There are spoilers in this review.  Beware.

So, the cover of the move says that it’s “Requiem for a Dream meets Near Dark.”  That is the biggest load of crap I have ever heard.  It’s got the blood spurts of Sweeny Todd, the melodrama of a Lifetime Original Movie (and not even a 2008-on one – BECAUSE THOSE ARE BETTER), the chemistry between the characters is non-existent and I found my finger itching to hit the “stop” button on the remote, but, like any horrifying situation, I couldn’t tear my eyes away.

Clare KramerClare Kramer plays Lisa, a twinkle-toed stripper who dates Maxx.  They are both former users.  Maxx thinks Lisa is using again, because she smells like throw up all the time, but we find out that she actually has some sort of cancer, and when that lady who played Faith’s new watcher in the third season of Buffy but then it turned out she just wanted that glove thing and they had to kill her shows up she can save her from dying from cancer so she turns her into a vampire.  Maxx sees Lisa at some goth club that his friends drag him to, where we meet Tom Lenk (Andrew from Buffy) in a delightful goth/sub cameo and it all goes downhill from there.

Matt KesslerMatt Kesslar plays Maxx, and while I loved him in The Middleman, I thought he was wooden and silly in this movie.

Jeremy Freaking SistoJeremy Sisto plays Darius, head of the vampire “family” and his accent ranges between a bad Russian accent to a bad southern accent.  I realize it’s on purpose to show how well-traveled and split-personalityish and everything he is, but it’s not even a good performance and it’s like he’s not even trying.  I told him about hanging out with Heather Graham…

Gwendolyn PostI don’t even know if this is the right picture.  The movie was all shady and shadowy, and she didn’t look exactly like Gwendolyn Post, so who knows?

Tom LenkTom Lenk plays Kronos.  He gets his throat ripped out.

It’s not even a fun movie.  It’s predictable and uninterestingly gory.  Lisa and Maxx go after the vampire family, kill them all, and meet the sun together in what is supposed to be a touching scene, but because of the complete lack of chemistry between the actors, it falls flat.  As does the “detox” scene earlier in the movie with its jerky camera work and crappy soundtrack.

And yay, I own this movie.

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Dear Rob Zombie

Are you pissed? If I were you, I’d be totally pissed. I have recently watched your Halloween remakes, and I have (unfortunately for you) watched the Nightmare on Elm Street remake as well. I’ve gotta say, as a longtime horror movie fan, your remakes came up horribly short.

By short, I don’t mean short on violence, sexual violence, or all-out terror. I just mean, well, that other guy? He wasn’t as heavy-handed as you were. I know it’s a year since you did Halloween II, and you didn’t expect this all-powerful online backlash (note the sarcasm) but your weirdo backstory techniques and ultra violence aren’t appreciated.

Elizabeth

Jeremy Sisto, Why Are You So Creepy?

Since I need constant distraction in the form of SOMETHING on the TV when I write (I know, it seems counterproductive, but honestly, if I don’t have the TV on I work SO SLOW) I have been watching up all of FEARnet‘s free stuff in honor of Halloween.  Just between you and me, I’ve even paid for a couple of movies – the Halloween and Nightmare on Elm Street reboots, in particular, but that’s a blog post for another time.  And by another time I mean, like, a few days from now.

One of the free movies on FEARnet is Hideaway – a based-loosely-on-a-Dean-Koontz-novel, maybe-the-worst-movie-ever, maybe-a-good-movie that came out the year I graduated high school.  The cast is surprisingly, like, pseudo-famous.  Jeff Goldblum, Christine Lahti, Alicia Silverstone (right before height of her pouty fame), Alfred Molina, and Rae Dawn Chong.  And Jeremy Sisto.

I’d seen the movie before, all dramatic and laden with mid-ninteties yummy alt/electronic/pre-emo emo rock.  We’ll pause a moment to talk about THAT before we address the central question, nay the THESIS of this blog post.  We’ll talk a little bit about the fact that TWO Miranda Sex Garden songs feature prominently in the film.  Miranda Sex Garden, in case you’ve never heard of them, were sort of a pre-Evanescence Evanescence.  Except instead of some guy who sorta raps, they had other chicks with soaring vocals.  The movie also featured a Fear Factory song (not even a BLIP on the radar in my too-goth-to-function world – guess I was a wanna-be), a KMFDM song (ahem, I still listen to them sometimes), a Front Line Assembly song, a Sister Machine Gun song…in 1995, for me?  A movie with a soundtrack like that would be AWESOME, and because there is a little part of me that is still that me who was me in 1995, I get a small thrill from remembering myself from those times.  Because time does change all things, and because I no longer look good in skinny jeans.

Anyway.  I could ramble on about how Dean Koontz hated this adaptation of one of his crappier novels, and how even though Christine Lahti is only two years older than Jeff Goldblum in real life that she looked, like, TEN years older, and how Alicia Silverstone pretty much does nothing but pout and shriek in this movie, but the overwhelming, bigger-than-all-of-us question is, Jeremy Sisto, why are you so creepy?

Hideaway
Now, granted.  Your character in Hideaway was SUPPOSED to be creepy.  You were a resuscitated devil-worshiping murderer who had a hard-on for Hell.  You wore way too much lip balm.  Your voice did that deep distorted thing.  It was seriously creepy. * SPOILER ALERT* Then, through some bitchin’ (not…) special effects you sort of explode at the end of the movie, and get absorbed by the big hell-type thing you sculpted out of dead people, and Jeff Goldblum had to use his glowy blue Heaven-magic to fight your evil juju.  You end up a part of the art you were creating, and presumably end up in hell, which is where you’d bought your time share (so to speak) anyway.

But you know what the thing is, Jeremy Sisto?  You just don’t get less creepy.

Your next role was as Elton in Clueless. The movie that made Alicia Silverstone super-famous and you?  Well, you played a teen hearthrob, but really you were just creepy.  You were sort of slimy and you looked like your hands were probably cold and sticky.  What?  I’m just sayin’.

Whether it’s creepy Billy in Six Feet Under, or the VICTIM in May, or just posing for paparazzi shots with your baby who you named Charlie BALLERINA, beeteedubs, you are pretty creepy.

I mean, why did they get you to play Jesus?  Maybe you were really good at it.  I never saw it.  Maybe, if I had seen it, I would think you were less creepy and this blog post might have never wormed its way through my chicken-fogged mind into existence.  Everything happens for a reason, Jeremy Sisto, and I was made to think you are creepy.

IMDB shot
creepy trying to look world-wise yet sensitive
Six Feet Under
creepy with Lauren Ambrose
White Squall
creepy (yet sorta handsome) discovering "discipline and camaraderie on an ill-fated sailing voyage"
plays jesus
creepy playing Jesus
with Heather Graham
creepy hanging out with Heather Graham - watch out Jeremy! The "being crap at acting" disease might be catching!
Family Jeremy Sisto
creepy shaving habits
Makes his Baby Dress Like a Hippie Clown
Makes his Baby Dress Like a Hippie Clown

So before you post a comment on, “Gee, tell us how you really feel” think about it.  Dude is creepy, no?

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